Locust Valley SD? (Oyster Bay, Syosset, Jericho: home, school district, college)
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I have never heard of anyone avoiding the Locust Valley school district.
It's a "boutique" type of district, with more in common with a prep school than a public school.
I'd prefer it over Jericho. Less "pressure cooker".
Why on earth would anyone tell you to avoid Locust Valley?
IB can be a very divisive issue for some individuals, especially those who do not subscribe to it's alleged political leanings and the fact it is a UN NGO. There are other issues related to IB that do not need to be described in this thread.
For this reason alone I can understand why parent's may want to "avoid" an IB high school.
I have never heard of anyone avoiding the Locust Valley school district.
It's a "boutique" type of district, with more in common with a prep school than a public school.
I'd prefer it over Jericho. Less "pressure cooker".
Why on earth would anyone tell you to avoid Locust Valley?
I don't know much about the district, but like I said, when we were looking everyone we asked told us to avoid it. They told us that there is a 'bad side of the tracks' in LV ('bad side of the tracks' by Gold Coast standards- I'm sure they didn't mean dangerous or anything lol) and most of the wealthy families send their kids to private school. I have certainly never heard of anyone comparing it to a prep school!! But like I said I was getting these comments 8-10 years ago so maybe things have drastically changed? But even now, I never hear of anyone moving there specifically for the schools. Where is it ranked now compared to Jericho, Syosset, CSH?
We are getting conflicting stories. Fist of, the LV schools ranked very well in 2012. Not as well as Jericho, etc, but well enough. Some people are saying "avoid it", others are telling us "its wonderful". Thats' why I'd like to get more input.
"Avoid" is a very strong word and it probably should only be used regarding a very few school districts across Long Island., LV is not one of them.
As for the rankings, they are complete BS as one of the principal components is calculated from the number of AP/IB test takers and not at all on how well the students perform. As a previous poster pointed out LV, at the high school level, when using hard metrics - SAT, IB scores, colleges matriculated - they are an average LI SD.
This is too funny. Avoid Glen Cove? Yeah, maybe, but even that could be a stretch. Avoid LV? C'mon people.
Like I said, that's what I was told by many people 10 years ago. Sounds like things have changed, which is great! Still, not sure that I would spend $2 mil on a house in a district that isn't at least in the top 10 LI school district rankings but that's just me...
I don't know much about the district, but like I said, when we were looking everyone we asked told us to avoid it. They told us that there is a 'bad side of the tracks' in LV ('bad side of the tracks' by Gold Coast standards- I'm sure they didn't mean dangerous or anything lol) and most of the wealthy families send their kids to private school. I have certainly never heard of anyone comparing it to a prep school!! But like I said I was getting these comments 8-10 years ago so maybe things have drastically changed? But even now, I never hear of anyone moving there specifically for the schools. Where is it ranked now compared to Jericho, Syosset, CSH?
I'm a graduate and my oldest son graduated from there is 2004.
There are no problems at LVHS. There are literally three streets in Locust Valley that are to be avoided - 13th 12th an 11th. The homes are built close together, and most are rentals. The people who live there work for the Gold Coast types. Today they are largely Hispanic. Still, it's hardly "The Hood".
The area near the train station (literally) are the low number streets. These look similar to a solidly middle class enclave in most North Shore villages. They were mostly built in the 1920s and they consist of Tudors, neo-Colonials, American Four Square, Federalist and Arts and Crafts type homes.
Bayville attends LVHS, and there are more middle class people there. When I grew up, there were a lot of Italians, Irish and some Polish students. At that time, not many of the Bayville kids were college bound. They were not necessarily college bound,
and some went to vocational school (BOCES) for part of the day. Today that seems to have changed.
We also had an influx of students from The Greenvale School and a few other "country day schools". In my son's case there were quite a few more ultra rich who decided not to attend prep or boarding school.
Socially, everyone seems to get along. The district is rather small, and knows your student. I liked that as a student and as a parent.
Unique to any Long Island school was that French was taught from Kindergarten on up. I am fluent to this day.
I liked the mix of students afforded by the Locust Valley district. Not everyone is typical Long Island Upper Middle class - but plenty are. Still, for a LI district, it's diverse.
I have no issue with the IB curriculum. As I understand it, Conservatives object to it, but I'm not sure why. If you are looking for a place on Long Island with a solid Conservative population, I'd recommend Locust Valley over Syosset or Jericho.
How/when did Locust Valley start to be considered a 'good' district? When we were first considering moving to LI, maybe 8-10 years ago, we were specifically told to *avoid* that district.
A new superintendent (part of the husband-and-wife team of LI superintendents making a combined $1+ million a year) came on board and, using an outside PR firm, mounted a campaign to make the district sound better than it actually is. All of a sudden, homeowners were bombarded with glossy newsletters full of rosy stories about student achievement. One has to remember, however, that this is a district with declining enrollment and rising budgets. As a result, the last time I checked, it cost taxpayers over $35K a year to educate each kid there (among the highest per-child costs in the country for public schools), which is approaching a year's tuition at Harvard and well beyond the annual tuition at the academically superior Friends Academy just down the road.
Locust Valley is an OK district. It's not bad enough to depress property values, but not good enough to rank with the likes of Jericho or Syosset.
A new superintendent (part of the husband-and-wife team of LI superintendents making a combined $1+ million a year) came on board and, using an outside PR firm, mounted a campaign to make the district sound better than it actually is. All of a sudden, homeowners were bombarded with glossy newsletters full of rosy stories about student achievement. One has to remember, however, that this is a district with declining enrollment and rising budgets. As a result, the last time I checked, it cost taxpayers over $35K a year to educate each kid there (among the highest per-child costs in the country for public schools), which is approaching a year's tuition at Harvard and well beyond the annual tuition at the academically superior Friends Academy just down the road.
Locust Valley is an OK district. It's not bad enough to depress property values, but not good enough to rank with the likes of Jericho or Syosset.
I would also like to hear why some people are saying to avoid locust valley school district. I've posted elsewhere and really struggling to make a decision on school districts and would like to hear more on LV if anyone has some insights.
Looking at LV on the main national ranking sites, it is a weird case.
Newsweek has LV as the 8th best LI district.
But They didnt even make the rankings cut at U.S. News.
Pequaman's rankings has LV as a great school but not in the top tier. His rankings use regents test scores whereas Newsweek and U.S. news are weighted more towards IB and AP testing.
It certainly seems like a very good district overall but I suppose the argument can be made it is one of the "weaker" of the rich north shore districts.
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